Saturday, September 15, 2012

BISHOPS IN DIALOGUE

Vatican II was a gathering of bishops from all over the
world. But it did not happen that
only bishops talked while all others merely listened. Non-bishops were there too, both cleric and lay, and also
women, acting as experts or periti. The voices that found a place in the
final documents were not just those of bishops. Notably, for instance, the decree on religious liberty owed
much to the teaching of John Courtney Murray, S.J. whose freedom to write and
lecture had been restricted by the Church before Vatican II.

The experience of bishops
in dialogue at the Council, I believe, is part of the reason why after Vatican
II there has been a growing number of people who do not think of the Church
mainly as Hierarchy but as the Body of Christ and the People of God, cleric and
lay, men and women.

Among the bishops themselves
dialogue was intense. In an article entitled “Conversation Starters” Richard Gaillardetz made the observation
that “some of the most important
work of the council was accomplished at the coffee bars (nicknamed after two
Gospel characters, Bar-Jonah and Bar-Abbas) kept open behind the bleachers in
the aula. Bishops, after struggling to stay awake during one mind-numbing Latin
speech after another, found respite at these coffee bars and often engaged in
frank conversation about a variety of topics. It was the sustained,
face-to-face conversation and sharing of diverse experiences that opened
episcopal eyes to new possibilities.”

One dynamic emphasized in
the article of Gaillardetz was the commitment of the Vatican II bishops to
humble learning. “In the century before the council it had become common to
divide the church into two parts: a teaching church (ecclesia docens) made up of the clergy and a learning church (ecclesia discens) consisting of the
laity. This way of imagining the church dangerously overlooked the fact that
bishops do not have a monopoly on divine truth.” Historians also “point out the remarkable willingness of so
many of the council bishops to become students once again. It is easy to forget
that a good number of bishops, then as now, found that their pastoral
responsibilities made it difficult for them to keep up with current historical,
biblical and theological scholarship.”
(Not to mention related secular sciences.) Even Bishop Albino Luciani
(the future Pope John Paul I) admitted feeling during the Council that
everything he had learned from the Jesuit Gregorian University had become
practically useless. He said that
fortunately he had an African bishop as a neighbor in the bleachers in the
council hall, who gave him the texts of the experts of the German bishops. That
helped him prepare better.

Another dynamic in the
Council was openness to the world.
“Pope John XXIII was convinced that Christians must be willing to read
‘the signs of the times’ and enter into a more constructive engagement with the
world. Indeed the history of the council can be read as a long struggle among
the council bishops to acquire a form of balanced engagement in which the
church could preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ with a humble confidence,
challenging the forces of hate and greed even as it affirmed the signs of God’s
reign already present in the world. Over the course of the council the bishops
became convinced that the times demanded a church that lived in vulnerable and
open mission to the world, effecting a transformation from within as leaven.
The council thereby turned its back on that pre-conciliar tendency to stand in
severe judgment of the world from some privileged Olympian heights.”

The importance of
dialogue in the Church remains
today. New problems have
arisen. The RH Bill problem is
perhaps the simplest. But the
church is struggling with others such as ordination of women, married clergy,
what to say about gay people, opening communion to the divorced, stem cell
debate, etc. Benedict has
recognized this and has put a priority on dialogue with the unbelieving world. He
has expanded the Pontifical Council for Culture to improve communication
between believers and nonbelievers, “which is often impaired, in his words, by
‘mutual ignorance, skepticism or indifference.’” To lead that dialogue, he
appointed Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, whose leadership has met with widespread
praise. Let me end with a
quote on the subject:

“When
controversies broke out lately over invitations by the Pontifical Academy for
Life and the Council for Culture to scientists whose research, especially on
stem cells, was thought to contravene Catholic teaching, the cardinal rose to give
a vigorous defense of dialogue with the church’s ideological opponents. ‘It’s a
shaky or fundamentalist grasp of faith that sparks suspicion or fear of the
other,’ Catholic News Service reported the cardinal saying. ‘When you are well
formed, you can listen to other people’s reasons,’ he added. Solid, serious
catechesis is compatible with respectful dialogue.

“At a time when it seems
that rote repetition of catechetical formulae is more and more expected of even
the most educated Catholics, the cardinal’s openness to dialogue and his trust
in Catholics of mature faith and learning to carry on such dialogue are reassuring.
In the modern world, the scandal
is not that Vatican officials would engage scientists who disagree with church
teaching, but rather that such engagement is regarded as taboo.”

2 comments:

Yes, the incessant need to squelch man's ideas. Seen in the libel provision of the new Philippine Cybercrime Law, and the closed-mindedness of partisan politics in the US, and the inflexibility of many in the Church. God gave us these great brains and somehow we go about making sure they are not used fully.